Sympathy
by Morgaur
Summary: Draco has not felt happy for a long time...but an act of sympathy brings its reward. Written for Challenge 77 on The Dark Lord's Most Faithful.


Draco banks his broom gently, so high above the ground that Malfoy Manor seems like a doll house down below. He inhales deeply, savouring the taste of the sweet, early morning fresh air, still tinged with the cold of night. Up here, on his broom, was for a long time the only place he could feel truly happy. Now nowhere is truly happy anymore, not since…he flinches away from the memory of that night. Its legacy is with him all the time, always there on his forearm, a tiny but persistent itch. Nothing, nowhere, no-one, can make him truly happy anymore. Not with the Dark Mark on his arm.

Still, here in the air, away from everyone and everything for a blessed while, here he can feel as close to truly happy as possible. For an hour or more he flies round the Malfoy estate, easily, almost lazily, enjoying the morning, basking in the peace. All good things must end, though, and finally he turns the broom towards the Manor with regret. On the ground he flicks the broom to a waiting elf and apparates indoors. He aims for a certain hallway, where the portrait of his favourite ancestor, Jocelyn Malfoy, hangs. He has a question he wishes to ask, one he has been mulling over during his all-too-brief flight of freedom.

The sight of a dishevelled blonde girl in house-elf rags kneeling on the floor and crying stops him in his tracks. He knows the girl; she was a Hogwarts student, a year below him, in Ravenclaw. A loony. Luna Lovegood. Now she is a prisoner, his father's prisoner.

What is his father's prisoner doing sobbing in a hallway, in house-elf rags? Why isn't she in the dungeons? As far as he knows she was there when he left, cooped up with that weirdo Ollivander.

She looks up and sees him, falling silent immediately.

"What are you doing?" he asks, walking towards her.

"I'm crying," she says, her voice shaky. "Or, at least, I was a moment ago. Now I'm just on the floor."

Draco sighs mentally. He'd heard there was something wrong with her. To him, there was something wrong with every non-Slytherin — hell, there was something wrong with every Slytherin who didn't acknowledge his primacy as the Malfoy scion — so he hadn't paid any heed to what scuttlebutt said of her. Now he realises what they meant when they said there was something wrong with her.

"Yes, I see that," he says, his voice bitingly sarcastic. "I mean what are you doing _here_. Out of the cell." In his mind he adds, and if you tell me you are in the hall or some other such literal interpretation I will…

"Your aunt Bellatrix took me out," Luna says, interrupting his mental threat. He blinks, confused, and is even more confused when she adds, "she wants me to be her slave."

For a moment Draco wonders why, in the name of Merlin, would his aunt want a human girl to be a slave when there were house-elves galore, then pushes the thought away. His aunt is insane, he knows that.

"That doesn't explain why you're in the hallway," he hisses, irritated now. Why should it be so hard to find out why this girl is slumped in the hallway crying, and incidentally preventing him from talking with Jocelyn? He realises that he has forgotten the question that he wanted to ask Jocelyn, and his irritation increases.

"She wanted me to make her tea," Luna says, and Draco loses his temper. He seizes her arm and yanks her to her feet, shoving her against the wall.

"What are you doing in this hallway, you fucking idiot?" he snarls, palming his wand with his other hand. By Merlin, he vows, if he doesn't get a sensible answer he will hex her brains out!

"Your aunt sent me to make tea but I didn't know where the kitchen was," Luna says calmly, giving a small sigh that is apparently aimed at him. He knows the type of sigh it is. He used to give it whenever that brat Potter was acting thick. The fact that she is giving it to him at first irritates him more, before he realises that the girl actually made sense. Of course she didn't know where the kitchen was. Of course she would have broken down crying — she was a Ravenclaw girl after all. For all that you could say about the blasted Gryffindors, at least they had the guts not to just start crying. Hell, even a pathetic Hufflepuff probably wouldn't. Ravenclaws were just too highly strung.

For a split-second he considers what to do, staring at Luna's forlorn face. He could just leave her there, he knows, and — Merlin knows — it's what he would be expected to do. But he suddenly realises he can't, he realises that somewhere in his heart he feels a twinge of sympathy for her. Maybe it is the after-effect of the morning flight, maybe it is something else, but he can't bring himself just to leave her.

"Come," he snaps, letting go of her arm abruptly. She staggers and clearly is verging on falling down, and Draco finds himself starting to reach for her, to steady her, but stills his arm, instead turning away and striding quickly off down the hallway. He hears her follow him as he heads to the kitchen, stopping outside the door.

"This is the kitchen," he says curtly, and turns to leave before pausing. "My aunt takes her tea black, with a shot of brandy." Again he starts to leave, then stops again. "Where is she?"

"The dining room," Luna says, her eyes fixed on his, wide and appealing, liquid somethings shimmering in their depths…Draco looks away, fixing his face in his most supercilious sneer.

"Right," he says, overloading his voice with as much condescension and contempt as he could muster. "To get to the dining room, go down this hallway, turn right, then left, and it's the third door on the left. Understand?"

"Yes," Luna says.

Draco glances back at her quickly, and looks away just as fast when he sees her giving him a thankful smile.

"Just be quick," he snaps, and turns to go.

"Thank you," he hears Luna say softly as he rounds the corner. He walks along the corridor for a few feet, then slumps against the wall. Why did I do that? he thinks. Why did I help her? She's a blood traitor, an enemy, a Ravenclaw, a Lovegood…she's Aunt Bella's slave, for Merlin's sake. It wouldn't hurt me if I left her…I should have just left her…

He stands bolt upright.

Fuck, he thinks, what if Aunt Bella asks her where she was? If Luna tells her it was me who showed her the way…

He dashes off down the hall, pauses, and apparates to a room just down the hall from the dining room. Coming out, he sees the dining room door closing behind Luna. As he walks towards the door, he racks his brain for what he would say. It hits him just as he enters the room.

"I knew she was lying," he says nonchalantly, realising with relief that he had just stopped Luna from explaining what had happened.

"What do you mean?" Bellatrix asks him, looking sharply at him.

"I found her going to the kitchen, saying she had to make you a cup of tea or some shit like that," Draco replies, taking care to make his voice as haughty and uncaring as possible. He saw his mother start at the word 'shit' and resists the urge to roll his eyes, and the only slightly weaker one to use other, stronger, profanities. Come on, mother, he thinks, I'm nearly eighteen now. I have the right to swear.

"So I took her down to the dungeons," he continues, sounding as convincing as he could.

"So how did she get back here with my tea?" his aunt says, her voice cold and suspicious.

Draco smirks. "I was halfway there when I figured it'd be better if she actually made you some tea and brought it to you. That way," he finishes, picking an orange from the bowl of fruit in the centre of the table, "you could punish her personally. Better than just locking her up, I think."

"You idiot," Bellatrix snaps, and his breath catches. Damn, he thinks. This is going to hurt… "She was telling the truth," Bellatrix says, and he breathes again.

"Oh," Draco says, trying not to let his relief show on his face. He pulls out a chair and sits down. Slowly he begins to peel the orange, spiralling from the top to bring the the skin off in one piece. Halfway through eating the segments he happens to glance aside at Luna, standing forgotten in a corner. She is watching him eat with a half-glazed look in her eyes, her lips moving in tune with his. As he watches she licks her lips and a sudden flicker of sadness crosses her face. Again Draco feels that stab of sympathy somewhere in his heart, and curses mentally. You can't do anything, he berates himself. You _shouldn't_ do anything.

But he can't help it. He hears Luna's stomach growl and curses again.

He glances at his aunt and mother. Narcissa is engrossed in her newspaper, and Bellatrix is busy reading a book. Quielty he murmurs a spell, tapping the orange peel with his wand. The peel wraps itself back into the shape of an unopened orange, the seams glowing green. A temporary binding spell, hiding the single uneaten orange segment within.

"Luna," he drawls, injecting every ounce of scorn he can muster into his tone, "throw this away." he extends his arm languidly, looking firmly away from the girl.

From the corner of his eye he sees Bellatrix look up sharply, narrowing her eyes at him. He sees in her piercing gaze suspicion and touches the wooden table leg under the tablecloth.

"You have house-elves, don't you?" she demands.

Maintaining a calm facade, he raises an eyebrow at her, seeing but outwardly ignoring her hand's motion towards her wand. Under the table he crosses his fingers and grips the wooden leg as hard as he can.

"Bella-" his mother says placatingly, and he feels a sudden, rare, surge of affection for his mother.

Bellatrix curls her lips but gives in, saying coldly to Luna, "Do what he says, then serve me in the library." Standing up, she sweeps from the room.

Draco releases the table leg, breathing a sigh of relief. He glances at Luna, jerking his hand at her. Slowly, she steps forwards and takes the peel from him. He expects her to leave, but she stands there uncertainly, hesitant. He groans mentally. Again with the lost business, he thinks. And, dammit, stop looking so pathetically appealing.

"The kitchen," he says, then realises that his tone was too soft. "You idiot," he adds hurriedly, in as scathing a tone as he can manage. And hurry, he appends. That spell won't last forever.

She meets his gaze, and again he sees the pain and sorrow in the liquid depths of her eyes. Gritting his teeth he looks away.

What is happening to me? he thinks, as she leaves the room. Why am I helping this girl?

With a sigh, he rests his head on his hand. As he mulls it over in his mind, he realises with a shock that for the first time in over a year, he is happy. Happier than he has been for some time, and all because he helped that Lovegood girl.

Well, he thinks sarcastically, this is going to be fun.


End file.
